FBI agents working alongside Utah state prosecutors in a wide-ranging corruption investigation have uncovered accusations of wrongdoing by two of the U.S. Senate’s most prominent figures — Majority Leader Harry Reid and rising Republican Sen. Mike Lee — but the Justice Department has thwarted their bid to launch a full federal investigation.

The probe, conducted by one Republican and one Democratic state prosecutor in Utah, has received accusations from an indicted businessman and political donor, interviewed other witnesses and gathered preliminary evidence such as financial records, Congressional Record statements and photographs that corroborate some aspects of the accusations, officials have told The Washington Times and ABC News.

But the Justice Department’s public integrity section — which normally handles corruption cases involving elected figures — rejected FBI agents’ bid to use a federal grand jury and subpoenas to determine whether the accusations are true and whether any federal crimes were committed by state and federal officials.

The information involving Mr. Reid and Mr. Lee is not fully developed but centers on two primary issues:

• Whether both or either politician sought or received money or other benefits from donors and/or fundraisers in connection with doing political favors or taking official actions.

• Whether Mr. Lee provided accurate information when he bought, then sold a Utah home for a big loss to a campaign contributor and federal contractor, leaving his mortgage bank to absorb large losses.

“There are allegations, but they are very serious allegations and they need to be looked at by somebody,” Sim Gill, a Democrat who is the elected chief prosecutor in Salt Lake County, told The Times. “If true, or even if asserted, they truly should be investigated and put to rest, or be confirmed.”

Remember the promises of the most ethical and transparent administration ever back in the day the left kept lying about how Boosh was both a retarded chimp and an evil mastermind, constantly abusing the law, cheating the American public, and obstructing justice? Well guess what: those of us that mentioned this was just projection by people that figured since they would certainly do it if they were in power, that the other side had to be doing it too (that and healthy dose of believing that the end justifies the means so lying is fine), and that we would have neither transparency nor ethical behavior from the left, sure seem vindicated. Yet again.

These people are criminals. They are unethical and care little what laws they violate, because they justify their actions as doing good. That they are doing what is good for them, regardless of the damage they cause, doesn’t matter to them or the rubes that line up to suck their cocks. Woe any of us though that dares to get in their way. Then they will warp the law, and even abuse it, to make us pay. Our country is basically being run by a bunch of infantile tyrants with delusions of grandeur and severe self-esteem issues. It is beyond tragic and vile, but of course, the problem is with people like me that dare point out that this is how leftists always end up behaving when they get power.

Reid, along with Holder and Obama, all deserve to spend the rest of their lives in prison making license plates for the people of this country. Instead these people continue to rob us blind.

ABC, CBS and NBC have so far refused to report the latest bombshell in the IRS scandal – a newly released list from the agency that showed it flagged political groups for “anti-Obama rhetoric.” On September 18 USA Today, in a front page story, reported the following: “Newly uncovered IRS documents show the agency flagged political groups based on the content of their literature, raising concerns specifically about ‘anti-Obama rhetoric,’ inflammatory language and ‘emotional’ statements made by non-profits seeking tax-exempt status.”

Not only have ABC, CBS and NBC not reported this story they’ve flat out stopped covering the IRS scandal on their evening and morning shows. It’s been 85 days since ABC last touched the story on June 26. NBC hasn’t done a report for 84 days and CBS last mentioned the IRS scandal 56 days ago on July 24.

The article by Gregory Korte went on to report: “The internal 2011 documents, obtained by USA TODAY, list 162 groups by name, with comments by Internal Revenue Service lawyers in Washington raising issues about their political, lobbying and advocacy activities. In 21 cases, those activities were characterized as ‘propaganda.’ The list provides the most specific public accounting to date of which groups were targeted for extra scrutiny and why. The IRS has not publicly identified the groups, repeatedly citing a provision of the tax code prohibiting it from releasing tax return information.”

The American Center for Law and Justice, a nonprofit legal institute that represents 33 of the groups appearing on the IRS list, said it appears to be ‘the most powerful evidence yet of a coordinated effort’ by the IRS to target Tea Party groups. ‘The political motivations of this are so patently obvious, but then to have a document that spells it out like this is very damaging to the IRS,’ said Jay Sekulow, chief counsel for the ACLJ. ‘I hope the FBI has seen these documents.'”

Heh, why would anyone think that the fucking fifth column would want to report that a government organization – if we know about the few cases involving IRS, I guarantee you there are far more cases within the IRS, and also in other government agencies with power, of this sort of abuse – helped one party win an election, through clearly criminal activity? Harm their golden boy? No way in hell. Americans need to be kept in the dark about this as well as any of the plethora of other “non-scandal scandals”.

All you have to do is ask how the media would be reacting if these revelations were happening when the guy in the WH had an (R) next to his name to know they are doing us a disservice. No wonder that the democrats think they can resort to destructive and tyrannical behavior without end, and get away with it. Nixon wants his presidency back….

The system is broke, no doubt about it. Many of the OWS crowd believe that it is broke beyond repair. I think it is repairable, nothing that some honesty and integrity in our leaders would not fix. But here’s the rub, much like Abraham bargaining with God over the fate of Sodom, where finding only 10 righteous men would have saved the city, finding leaders, anywhere with honor and integrity is proving difficult.

We all remember the Bell, Ca. scandal, where the mayor, city manager, and several city council members were all arrested for corruption, having inflated salaries, 4-5 times what would be considered normal for that job. But this isn’t like robbing a bank, they got their money semi legally (hence, the broken system), you can bet their defense will be as simple as this, they negotiated in good faith with the city to obtain those salaries, nobody put a gun to the heads of the city officials that accepted their contracts, the city was willing to get robbed and handed over the money month after month.

Shortly after the Bell scandal California controller John Chiang decided he would post all public employee salaries on his website, so now if you are a public employee anywhere in California, citizens have instant access to what you are making, about damn time.

But just because that information is available does not mean that some public employees want it disclosed, and some will even go extra ordinary lengths to keep their gravy train under wraps, including threatening those that ask the ridiculous, a little transparency wrt their employees:

It goes like this: Libby questioned the high salary and benefits of the city manager in the small Riverside County town of Indian Wells and was subsequently fired by his private employer after the city manager complained about him. Libby needed to learn “that such public discourse comes at a price,” the city manager wrote in a letter to Libby’s employer.

The price Libby paid was to lose his job as a bank vice president.

When Libby started poking around Indian Wells, population 5,000, in August, the city manager, Greg Johnson — who has since resigned — quickly went on the offensive. How dare Libby inquire about Johnson’s $283,000 salary and lucrative benefits, which that included free carwashes and something called “VIP” medical treatment at a hospital should he need a doctor.

Haddon Libby is a guy just like all of us, he lives within the system, takes pride in his community, and cared about that community. Whatever the impetus was for him poking around to see what his city officials were making (all citizens should be as curious) once he found out it became instantly apparent that the city could not afford such a lavish salary with benefits, many of those benefits are enumerated in the article.

When Libby filed a Public Records Act request with the city for more information, Johnson replied to it, copying Libby’s boss at First Foundation Bank, calling the $8 million estimate a lie and saying, “I guess we have a problem.”

Then, according to his lawsuit, Libby’s boss told him to “tread carefully” and that he would get fired if he exercised his right to sue the city for more information about Johnson or even just met with the manger.

The City Manager is the CEO of the city, he is not elected like the mayor, he has to have the education and training to do the job, he is the most powerful city official. And you would be surprised how much city managers get paid, I was. But salaries for this position do vary widely, usually commiserate with the size (population) of the city. Indian Wells, population 5000, should fall within the low end of the spectrum, it doesn’t. My little town, pop. around 25,000, pays it’s CM 237K (it’s the Bay Area, figures). The low end of most Ca. cities is around 180K with what Johnson was making as the Cadillac plan.

The amount in of itself is not that outrageous, it is in the ball park of other cities, but clearly, Johnson knew that there were too many cookies in his hand and was willing to do whatever it took to keep the information private.

Libby persevered (good for him) and was subsequently fired. The good news is that Johnson resigned (scumbag) and Libby is suing both the city and his employer for wrongful termination. Here is hoping he wins a boatload of money in judgment.

But governmental corruption is like cockroaches, for everyone one you see, there is a half a dozen hiding behind the refrigerator. This stuff goes on all the time and there are probably hundreds of Johnson’s out there, and we can’t count on Haddon Libby to visit every city in America spotlighting government malfeasance for us, we have to do this ourselves.

The smaller the government, the more transparent it is, that is why the Tea Party has it right, reducing the size of government and limit their power to only what they need to do their job, and most of the OWS is not. Destroying capitalism, or perversely perverting it (forgiving your debt to the detriment of the loaner) is not the way to go.